


Roots Entwined

by qwanderer



Series: cherry trees can grow in space [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: I steal plots and recontextualize them, JUST, M/M, Voltron Season 6 Spoilers, actually spoilers for the whole show, heads up I edited Shiro's backstory after I gained new info, it's what i do, like a lot of them
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-17
Updated: 2018-06-17
Packaged: 2019-05-24 11:36:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14953934
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/qwanderer/pseuds/qwanderer
Summary: A different Shiro always comes back from time spent as a prisoner of the Galra. Keith recognizes that that is inevitable, but when this new Shiro's jokes ring a little hollow, Keith wonders what exactly has changed.





	Roots Entwined

**Author's Note:**

> Mind the spoilers!
> 
> Edit: there have been some (largish) tweaks to Shiro's backstory as my headcanons evolved.

Flight school is just a stupid dream. 

That's what Keith tells himself, anyway. Mr. Shirogane tries to tell him different. He offered Keith a safe place to stay during breaks while he was in flight school, and he'll always be grateful, but it's not home. He doubts it ever will be. The kind old man is always encouraging, but he never seems to get the part of Keith that needs to fight. 

He doesn't know where it comes from, but he knows fighting is in his blood. The only clue he has is his knife. And he's never seen anything like it on Earth. 

It's so stupid. The very reason he wants so much to be out in space is the same thing that's holding him back. 

Then Mr. Shirogane's grandson comes home to visit for the holidays. Keith hasn't seen much of Shiro, despite the fact that it was Shiro who had backed Keith's application. Shiro's a top graduate and they have him off on missions, more often than not. 

The times Keith has seen Shiro, he's gotten the impression of someone who's solid, like a tree. Someone who won't be moved unless he wants to be. It's appealing, especially for a kid who has had so much pulled out from under his feet. Keith has never felt like he's standing on solid ground. 

"Granddad tells me that you're thinking of quitting flight school," Shiro says now. "He doesn't understand why it's so hard for you. But flight school's hard for everyone, some more than others. Sometimes it's the people who have the most trouble who find it the most worthwhile once they get through it." 

"You didn't have trouble," Keith says sulkily. 

Shiro laughs. "That's not true," he says. "But the trouble I did have, I managed to keep from my grandfather. And a lot of the time, I regret that. I think it might have been easier if I'd told him what I was going through. It's okay to have trouble. And it's okay to ask for help." 

Other people have told Keith the same thing, but from Shiro, he believes it. 

* * *

Keith's a horny little kid when he first propositions Shiro. 

He wouldn't have, except that during one of their chats, Keith squirms a little, and Shiro just says, "Something else is bothering you." 

Keith looks at Shiro, assessing, knowing that Takashi Shirogane is the one person he can tell (almost) anything to. 

He lifts his chin, and forges ahead. 

"Would you sleep with me?" he asks. 

Shiro frowns. "Are you having nightmares?" 

Keith crosses his arms, looking away. "Not like that," he says. 

"Oh," Shiro says, and it sounds like it's more to himself than to Keith. "Why are you asking?" The question's said more gently than Keith is comfortable with, but it's Shiro, so it's not too bad. 

"I've been getting distracted really easily. I thought it would help." He scrunches up his face, then continues, "You said I could always ask for help." 

Shiro looks amused, but like he thinks he shouldn't be. "I didn't mean with this." 

"I thought you meant with anything. Come on. I'm tense, and it's making me stupid." 

There's enough of a pause before Shiro shakes his head "no" that Keith thinks he's not completely uninterested. But the answer is firm. 

Keith wants to tell himself that Shiro made a mistake turning him down, but deep down he knows he's still just a kid and he trusts Shiro enough to make that call for him. 

It becomes almost a running joke, just between the two of them. Shiro always says no, but there's always something behind his eyes, a warm glint that makes it sound like "not yet." 

* * *

Keith stays in flight school for Shiro. When the Kerberos mission is lost, Keith wants to hope. But without Shiro there to tell him that every challenge can be overcome, with Shiro declared missing on a remote moon, it doesn't seem worth the effort anymore. 

Shiro's granddad (he'll always be Shiro's granddad to Keith, not his, even if he's family) just reminds him painfully of Shiro. He has to get out. He wants to be out in the stars, but he's drawn to the desert as well. So with the stars out of reach, he goes to the desert. 

He ends up pacing an empty, arid stretch of land, like a lion pacing the reach of his territory. 

* * *

When Keith finds Shiro, alive, it's amazing, but it's also different. Shiro's gone through a lot, it's obvious, and if he's still the same strong tree, sometimes he creaks a little in the wind. They don't joke quite the same way, not anymore. But they're still close. They have to be. And as the team works to save the universe, they get even closer. 

Shiro helps Keith through the difficult times, like he always has. And sometimes, Keith feels like he's really managed to help Shiro, too. 

Keith just wishes Shiro would stop ruining it - praising him by saying, "If anything happens to me...." before his usual insistence that Keith can do great things. 

Nothing's going to happen to Shiro. Shiro always manages to stand back up. There is no other universe worth living in. 

* * *

The Black Lion is empty. 

It can't be, but it is. Its paladin is nowhere to be found. 

Keith just wants Shiro back, but despite what Keith's heart might feel, the universe didn't stop burning when Takashi Shirogane vanished (again) from its midst. Someone needs to pilot the Black Lion. And Keith's brain is an endless loop of "If anything happens to me...." 

He hates it, but he sits in the chair that is Shiro's. Another home that will never be Keith's. Not without Shiro there, too. 

He sits in the chair, and he lets himself feel a connection to the Black Lion that should never have been his, but is. He lets himself feel, and he can feel Shiro's presence in the cockpit and imagines Shiro's large, strong hands folding over his and guiding him. 

The wish for that to be more than an imagined sensation nearly knocks him flat, but the team needs him. He lifts his chin, and faces the enemy as the head of Voltron. 

* * *

Every time Keith pilots the Black Lion, he feels closer to Shiro. Every time his hands grip the bars, it feels like a caress that will never be real. 

It's a kind of torture, but there are so many reasons he can't tear himself away. He lies to himself, tells himself that the biggest reason is because the universe needs a Black Paladin. The universe needs Voltron, and Voltron needs a leader. 

Most of the time, he believes himself. But every time he touches the control bars, he knows better. 

He knows he doesn't do this for the universe. He does it because of that voice that still echoes in his head. 

"If anything happens to me...." 

"Don't give up." 

He won't give up on himself. He knows Shiro would hate that. 

But he's also not giving up on Shiro. 

Not ever. 

* * *

Keith rescues Shiro. 

A different Shiro always comes back from time spent as a prisoner of the Galra. Keith recognizes that that is inevitable, but when this new Shiro's jokes ring a little hollow, Keith wonders what exactly has changed. 

Keith tries not to wonder what it means that the imaginary Shiro who helps him pilot the Black Lion still feels closer to him than the flesh-and-blood man who now leads their missions from the Castle. 

He gives it time. But it doesn't get better. 

Keith has to get away. There are a lot of reasons. He tells himself that there are a lot of reasons. He tells himself that the Blade of Marmora needs him. 

He doesn't listen to the little voice that says it's mostly because there's a distance behind Shiro's eyes and making that distance physical might make it hurt less. 

He doesn't listen when it tells him that he's searching for a family he's never known because all the family he has known seems unreachable right now. 

* * *

Two years spent stuck in a time-dilation field, riding a space-whale with his long-lost mother and their pet space-wolf seems like it should make him feel more adrift, but it doesn't. He misses everyone, but he also knows some things he didn't before. He feels like... even if he's not a tree with roots in the Earth, he knows a lot more about what his foundations are now. He knows what stays the same about him, no matter what. 

When he punches the code to call the Paladins, somewhere in the back of his mind is a voice that mentions how "must be almost twenty-one by now" feels a lot closer to twenty-five than eighteen had. For Shiro and the others, it's only been a few days. 

It's good to be back with the others. Things still don't feel quite right with Shiro, but the Keith that's returned this time is different. He doesn't need so much of his self-worth to hang on one man's words. No matter how important that man is to him. 

* * *

It becomes terribly clear soon enough that Shiro is no longer the solid, unmovable tree he once was. 

He's lost his grip on himself, maybe because of his arm, maybe because of Zarkon's witch and her magic, maybe some lingering result of Zarkon's link with the Black Lion. Whatever it is, it's making Keith's mind blare all the alarms that before had only been sounding tiny tentative chirps. That feeling that things have been _wrong_ between the two of them is twisting Keith up viciously. 

All Keith knows is that if anyone is going to be able to reach Shiro, to bring him back, it's Keith. So Keith charges ahead, following Shiro with everything he has, desperately trying to reach him. 

Shiro lures him away from the others, takes him to a place where it's just the two of them... and dozens upon dozens of silent, terrifying clones of Shiro. 

All this time. This hasn't been Shiro? 

No. The Black Lion let him pilot, let him lead Voltron. This man in front of him can't be completely unlike the Shiro they knew. 

If this isn't him, where else can Keith look? 

Shiro has to be in there somewhere. Keith has to be able to bring him back. Keith gives it all he has. 

"You told me you'd never give up on me," he reminds Shiro. 

This Shiro's eyes spark and glow Galra purple, and he turns on Keith, saying the most cruel things he could possibly say. Hitting weak spots that only Shiro knows precisely how to lever open. 

A younger Keith would be lost. This Keith is on the very edge. They're both going to die here unless Keith can do something about it. 

"I love you," he tells him, just in case he doesn't get another chance. 

And then Keith is rooted in the Black Lion, drawing on its strength, using the black bayard to take down the twisted Shiro, and occupying the space that is the home of the Black Paladin and no one else. He lets the Black Lion be his home. Sinks into that space with everything he is. 

The physical world fades away. 

Shiro is there. The real Shiro, his voice, his face, the warmth behind his eyes. Shiro tells Keith how he died, all those months ago, his body completely obliterated from the Black Lion's cockpit by the sheer force of Zarkon's quintessence. 

But Shiro still exists, Keith's solid tree, creaking a little more, maybe, but roots firmly buried in the Black Lion's mind. 

Keith doesn't know how to feel. Is it a relief, to know that the distance between them was never real? That the Shiro he'd been fighting beside was a bad copy created by Zarkon's witch? Should he be grieving the death of his Shiro? 

He can't find any answers inside himself, as well as he's come to know himself. This is what he knows: This time he's not letting go. Shiro's spirit is with the Black Lion's and this time, when Keith grips the bars, he imagines that he's holding on to Shiro's hands, keeping Shiro close, keeping him from slipping farther away. 

* * *

There's no time to think, when they return to the other Paladins. There's fighting to be done. 

Sometimes Keith hates that the only time he feels truly connected to his own emotions is when he's fighting. Right now, it's a gift. 

Keith grips the control rods and fights with everything he has. When he fights beside the other paladins in the Black Lion, knowing Shiro is there too, Keith thinks nothing could ever be quite as exhilarating as this. 

When they first enter the quintessence field, Keith's connection with the Black Lion flares open. It's like the lion, and Shiro, are all around him, the energy that makes up the universe sparking between his fingertips as he leads Voltron against Lotor. 

But the more they fight, the more the purple glow of energy builds under his hands, in the Black Lion, the more wrong, familiar, and twisted it feels. Like the distance behind Shiro's eyes when he was only a clone, when they were fighting. When the witch's control overcame the echo of Shiro's personality that the clone had been given. 

The quintessence here is too strong for them. It will overcome them, if they let it. Destroy them utterly. All the paladins, all the lions, even the real Shiro. 

That's what stops Keith, when he is always the one spoiling for a fight, always the first to charge ahead into reckless danger. Watching the thirst for power, for quintessence, overcome a clone of Shiro was bad enough. 

It cannot happen to the real Shiro. Always strong. Always level. Always good. Always a paladin to the core. Rooted so strongly in the Black Lion that he overcame even death. 

It. Cannot. 

Keith turns his back on this fight, and Voltron follows. 

* * *

Keith still has the unconscious body of their clone. He couldn't leave the clone, knowing there was even a little bit of Shiro in him. 

When he explains it to the others, he doesn't say that. He explains it as if there's something he thinks they can do about the fact that they have Shiro's spirit and Shiro's body, or at least a reasonable facsimile, even though they aren't attached to each other. 

Allura smiles. 

Keith can barely stand to let himself hope. 

When the glow fades under Allura's fingertips, and Shiro's eyes open, and he sits up, and he is himself, Keith thinks nothing could be more of a relief. 

Then Shiro slumps against him, exhausted but alive, trusting Keith to catch him, and it might be muffled by layers of armor and they aren't in each other's heads, but the moment between them, it feels... real. And that is a relief. 

Shiro twists a little further into Keith's arms, and his breath is warm and soft on Keith's neck for just a moment, and Keith thinks that Shiro has never felt closer. Even in their armor, there's something soft and vulnerable about Shiro's trust in him that Shiro has never quite let him see this clearly before. 

Shiro had put his career on the line for Keith. He'd put his life on the line, many times, for all of them. But this? This is something else again. 

The lions roar, and conversation goes on around them, but for that small moment all Keith can think about is Shiro slumped exhausted in his arms. 

* * *

They're going home. With the Castle gone, they all have to share the lions. Keith and Shiro both walk to Black automatically. It's home for them both. 

It's when they get to the main chair that they run into each other, both trying to sit in the same seat. 

Keith stops and waves Shiro to sit, and then, smugly, sits in his lap as if it's a throne. 

"We can't both drive," Shiro says, with that expression that means he's amused but thinks he shouldn't be. 

"How do you know?" Keith asks, mock-defiantly. "Have you tried?" 

Shiro gets a thoughtful look in his eye, and then says, "Well, I guess in a way, we have both been steering the Black Lion at the same time. I just didn't have the chair." 

"No," Keith agrees, "you _were_ the chair. I just don't see any reason why we should change that." 

"That's not exactly how it..." Shiro starts, but gets distracted very quickly when Keith squirms in his lap. Shiro tries to glare, but fails miserably. Keith just grins. 

He finds Shiro's left hand with his, guiding it to the control rods. Shiro lets him. Their fingers are threaded together on the control bars of the Black Lion and it's Keith's hand that wraps around the outside of Shiro's, protecting, leading. He feels like it's his turn. 

Shiro just relaxes into it, hooking his chin over Keith's shoulder and giving a contented little sigh. 

Keith sinks halfway into the realm of the lion, curious if he'll still feel Shiro's presence there, even with Shiro back in a proper body again. It's there, stronger than ever. Shiro always did have a profound connection to the Black Lion. That hasn't changed. 

Now Keith can feel it and know it for what it is, and at the same time Shiro's hand is warm and solid under his, and Shiro's breath brushes his chin. 

Keith is full of a feeling he cannot name. 

He grins, and pushes the control rods forward, making Black race ahead. "Nothing out there is a match for us," he says. "Not together." 

Life is a fight, the whole universe is a fight, and here in the Black Lion, everything makes sense. 

"When did you get so good at this?" Shiro asks. 

"At what?" Shiro's always believed in Keith's ability as a pilot, a paladin, a leader. None of that can be a surprise. 

"Me." 

Keith laughs, sudden and bright. "I've been working on that puzzle for a while now," he says fondly. "I was bound to figure it out sooner or later." 

Shiro hums in answer. "I guess you were." 

Keith turns his head just enough to catch Shiro's eye, and quirk a smile. "Sleep with me?" he asks quietly. 

Shiro gives another one of his happy sighs, and curls a little tighter around Keith. "I think this time I could be persuaded." 

Keith pulls his left hand from its rod, leaving Shiro to control that one, and twists just far enough to kiss Shiro. It's light and quick, has to be, with their helmets on, but everything behind it vibrates through the lion, and Black roars. 

"Oh my God, Black Paladins," Lance yells at them. "Turn off your comms!" 

"With pleasure," Keith agrees, and does. 


End file.
